


Haunted by the ghost of you

by kissed



Category: Secret History - Donna Tartt
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, Henry is still dead I'm sorry, M/M, Richard not so much, The Secret History - Freeform, camilla got out of it alive and well, first person POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 02:54:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29429130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kissed/pseuds/kissed
Summary: “Do you resent me?” she had asked. I look in her general direction but not at her, past her left shoulder where the entrance as if the one I want would materialize and wake me from this bad dream but I knew it wouldn't, I shook my head. I started to hear her quiet sobs, I squeezed her hand to offer support.
Relationships: Richard Papen/Henry Winter
Comments: 3
Kudos: 10





	Haunted by the ghost of you

It had been a complete coincidence when Camilla and I ran into each other in the cafe. Her husband, I later learned, was laughing at something the waiter had said as they were led to their table while I was on my way back to mine after using the toilet. I had caught a whiff of her scent at first as I walked passed her, I thought to myself how incredibly unlikely it would be that she was the one who I had passed by because she never made an indication that she would step back in Vermont especially somewhere so near where unforgettable things have occurred but she called my name, albeit too softly and stopped me with a light hand on my elbow and I pace back, startled and I saw her unchanging face save for a few minuscule lines beside her eyes, her hair cut shorter than when we were in Hampden, her complexion better, daresay sported a little bit of a tan and peppered the area around her nose with small freckles that I found were incredibly charming. Gone were the days where her back was wound tight and her back stiff as a board as she walked through the halls from one class to another. She always has been charming in my eyes. Beautiful and petite in her stature, I could have held her in my arms with one hand and enveloped her way back when but we were all preoccupied with other things that needed our undivided attention. Other than our two closest friend’s deaths on our backs, it was Camilla healing from her own trauma and myself, fighting my own demons that would not let me sleep a wink. 

I nodded to her husband when he had left with a kiss on her cheek. Told her calmly and collectively to call when she was ready to be fetched, Camilla nodded and kissed his cheek back as softly as he had. I watched the whole scene play before my eyes, my chest feeling full at the same time heavy with how Camilla had found her own peace with him. She turned her attention back to me when her husband had turned and left, my hand swirling what’s left of my wine and thinking about how it has been too long since I’ve seen Camilla Macaulay last. 

“How have you been?” she started. I shrugged my shoulders and gave her an easy smirk. Something I might not have done before when we were still in school, I might have answered her with a one word to appease her then moved on to the next but things change, we are older now and Camilla will more or less have to accept that I have gotten much looser and lenient with life. 

I look at her, tipping my head towards her direction to rally the question back. She smiles. 

“Better. Loads. I have children. Can you believe it?” I can, and smile back at her. Genuinely this time and glance at her slender fingers to peer at the shiny wedding band gracing her left ring finger. It burns a little bit but it ebbs away almost instantly, I had to attend a lot of therapy sessions to have done that so effortlessly.

We talk about her life. About her three children, two boys and one girl. No twins unfortunately but it would probably show up in her children once they get their own kids. _The gene skips_ , she skims and I nod. I dare not ask about Charles even when my tongue itches to do so. Last I heard he was living across the world with nothing but the clothes on his back, _finding himself,_ Francis had briefly explained. Camilla asks questions and I answer diligently, giving just as much to placate her hunger for information but not enough to spill the details I do not wish to share. About my family in California, _Gone_ , I say and she looks down to offer her condolences and adds, _me too, Nana died three years ago,_ a second passes then she adds, _didn’t bother to show up._ I didn’t have to ask who she was pertaining to and I think she was glad that I was still as sensitive as I was back then. 

Camilla asks me where I live, I tell her three blocks from here and she nods, then notices the pin on my lapel and the keychain on my ratty satchel that hung behind my wooden seat then started back up at me. Her delicate hands cover her opened lips, eyes widening by the second and glistening as if a tear threatened to fall into her creamy skinned cheek. _Greek?_ the tone questioning between her hands but I still caught it, no matter how quiet her voice was and I took what’s left of my wine and downed it one go then nodded in silence, looking everywhere but in her direction because if I did, I would have started to feel irritation and dislike right there. If I did, she would have started to sob and that would have been incredibly difficult to explain to her husband later when he fetches her. 

The silence that sat between us was strained, the air charged with tension and I wanted nothing but to get away from it but I haven’t seen Camilla in so long and I would be lying if I said being in her presence truly brought me down a peg or two again. That my life wasn’t so normal after all, that all my emotional baggage and insomnia came from a place where I tried so fucking hard to push aside and ignore. Yet seeing and getting to talk to her, it had came back like it was yesterday. Like it was the first time I had knocked on Julian’s door and his handsome face peeked through just so and asked politely what I needed. 

I was just about to get up because I couldn’t sit there and run through the memories that I worked so hard to forget, worked so hard to be where I am right now and not the Richard Papen who scrambled in the dark in the aftermath of it all. When she spoke, her voice sounded so tender as if she if she wasn’t careful I would break into two and I wouldn’t be able to stitch myself back up. 

“Do you resent me?” she had asked. I look in her general direction but not at her, past her left shoulder where the entrance as if the one I want would materialize and wake me from this bad dream but I knew it wouldn't, I shook my head. I started to hear her quiet sobs, I squeezed her hand to offer support. 

“If it wasn’t for me, Charles wouldn't have pushed him to the edge. It didn’t have to end the way it did,” she gets it out in between the hitching of her breath. I fish out my handkerchief and pass onto her to use, she takes it gratefully and wipes her eyes. 

“Then you would have lived a hellish life broken and bruised by your own brother that we all loved so much and He-” I stopped. I haven’t said his name in so many years. And by grace, I think the universe had conspired to not let all the other same named humans walk my way. I take another deep breath and pushed past my thoughts. Nearly forty years old and I am still stumbling over myself for saying one simple name that I long for. 

“He wouldn’t have wanted you to be unhappy,” I couldn't say it but I did not stutter at all and I was rewarded with her warm smile. Oh how I’ve missed it so. 

“But you are,” and the twinge in her tone made it so hard for me to digest the back up emotions I repressed for so long. I let a tear escape and shake my head, wiping it away. 

“I have no right,” the guilt comes in waves during days when I thought it was hard to breath. When his features start to grow fuzzy in memory or when I have a momentary lapse and forget how his voice drawls when he speaks Latin as he drinks the exquisite scotch in Francis’ Aunt’s home in the country. A dying cigarette perched between his lips. Glasses in perfect condition sitting on the apex point of his tall nose. Handsome and full of life. 

Soon after the heavy conversation, her husband comes between the doors of the cafe. His expressive eyes widened in question and asked her what’s wrong, she smiled and told him seeing old friends always made her this incredibly emotional. I played along and shrugged my shoulders, then stood up to shake his hand and told them to have a safe trip back to their hotel. Camilla’s husband nods back and shakes my hand firmer than the first one he gave me earlier as if it’s payback for making her beautiful wife cry, I didn’t do anything but shook his hand like what I had done earlier. After that awkward interaction, Camilla had latched her dainty stature towards me, arms around my neck and her front flushed with mine. Her lips close to my ear as she whispers, _Henry loved you best_ then squeezes one last time and let me go. 

I sat there long after she and her husband left and drank my weight in alcohol as I let myself believe in her words. Then when tomorrow comes and sobriety finds me again, I go back to pretending that I am where I want to be. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I tried. lol hope you liked it :)


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